


maidens and rabid dogs

by pxrsephoneofeden



Series: Clegane-Stark family au [2]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Childhood Memories, Drabble and a Half, F/M, Faith of the Seven, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Growing Up, Light Angst, Original Character-centric, Other, Sappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-01
Updated: 2019-09-01
Packaged: 2020-10-04 14:09:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20472317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pxrsephoneofeden/pseuds/pxrsephoneofeden
Summary: a drabble i wrote centered around my original character, Morganna Clegane-Stark and her experiences with the faith of the seven holiday of “Maiden’s day”goes along with my other SanSan drabble but is mostly focused on the original character





	maidens and rabid dogs

_ A crackling fire blazed heavily onto the prepubescent bodies covered by a fortress of quilts and cushions resting on the ice-cold wooden floor of a child’s bedroom. Two whispering voices were discussing their predictions for their own futures, as well as each other’s, performing a haphazardly executed reading of tea leaves from a stolen kettle in the kitchen from that same morning’s breakfast. _

_ Morganna Clegane, a girl of eight, and the eldest child of Sansa Stark, and Sandor ‘The Hound’ Clegane, watched intently as the girl in front of her downed her cold, bitter tea, like a drunken soldier in a tavern, concealing a laugh as her face twisted into a harsh frown due to the ripe taste. She snatched the cup from the girl’s pudgy hands and stared into the remnants of the strained leaves in the syrupy backwash left by the other girl. _

_ “You’re going to live on a beautiful beach with white sand and a castle twice as big as mine!” She flashed a toothy grin, and the sun-kissed (rather burned) girl nodded her head in acceptance. Morganna bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing, smirking at her antsy partner in prediction. _

_ “...and you’re going to marry lord Herry Kenning of Kayce!” exclaimed the soot haired young girl, wearing a pristine white dressing gown as she sat, laid on her belly, elbows knocking with her companion, dressed in similar apparel, but with a golden Kraken sewn onto the pocket. _

_ The other, crooked toothed child gasped and immediately began denying the accusation, slapping the cup of old tea leaves out of her friend’s hand _

_ “There’s no way am ironborn like me will ever marry such a fruit! He’s round like a berry and probably doesn’t even know how to sail!” Everly Pyke, the bastard daughter of the iron island’s first queen Yara, pouted at her friend’s mocking as she made sure to refuse the fate. _

_ The cup hit the ground and cracked, the two giggled and shushed each other, praying their plans to stay up the entire night to see if the sun really does rise, or if it just appears out of thin air, would be squashed by their parents or a servant catching them awake at such an hour. _

_ The shorter, lighter haired girl stood up quickly, swiftly gliding her gangly form across the room, her dressing gown looking foreign on her boyish appearance. Morganna watched Everly, studying her whilst she made her way to the furthest end of the room. Her loosely wavy hair was cleaner than her friend had seen it the whole week she’d been staying with the Stark-Clegane family in the North, and her flimsy, dainty, white dressing gown was seen by Lady Sansa herself, and her eyes were shiny, and tan brown, they reminded her of her father’s ale he sometimes drank a little too much of at dinner. Morganna always saw her friend as more of a little boy than a girl, even though they both were tomboyish. Everly was stern-faced, and outspoken just like her mother, whereas Morganna was shy, soft-featured, and already pretty enough at nine to rival any girl in Winterfell, with her mahogany brown hair and freckled pale skin. _

_ Morganna watched as her willowy friend climbed up onto the windowsill, and motioned for her to join her at the opened window. She climbed hesitantly, the story of her own uncle’s descent from a windowsill haunting her brain. _

_ “Look! Morri!” Her fearful trance was broken by her companion helping pull her onto the sill, they dangled their exposed legs off the edge and felt the crisp Northern air send chill bumps onto their calves and forearms. Everly pointed excitedly at the red burning light emitting from the tall trees, with tops still coated in fluffy snow.  _

_ The sunrise wasn’t where Morganna had her attention set on, rather it was focused on the town below. The maiden’s day celebration commenced in a few hours. The town was decorated in lacy white ribbons and jewel-toned Hellebore flowers rested in bouquets everywhere she looked. The snow in the town part of Winterfell was long gone, the deep emerald grass complemented the flowers used for the parade.  _

_ Morganna knew one day this whole city, and even more castles, snowy trees, and places that held beautiful maiden day celebrations would one day be hers. Her mother was wardeness of the North, and beloved at that. She was a Stark, a wolf with roots embedded in ice and loyalty, and she was a Clegane, a forceful, imposing sigil of strength. _

_ She heard the septa’s gathering water from the well directly beneath her and Everly, she rested her head on the Pyke girl’s shoulder as she saw them pour the sleet from the water into buckets. The clock tower rang loud and booming, she closed her eyes and prepared for her mother to enter her chambers, dress her in a fine silky dress, bell sleeved, and embroidered with wolf pups and playing children on the hems and edges. Everly roped a hand through her hair, silently praying to the god of the Mother, and the Drowned God himself that maybe in Winterfell, she’d escape the dreaded bastard comments on the celebratory day of maidenhood, and that she’d get to enjoy it like her friend, the adored little princess of the north, got to. _

  
  


The house of the Stark-Clegan family home in Winterfell was unusually quiet, and chilly from the short-lived winter they were finally escaping from. The eldest daughter was currently upstairs, braiding her hair into an intricate pattern onto the top of her head, giving herself of a crown of shiny ember vines. She pinned it in place and walked over to her bed, slipping off her dressing gown and shivering in the freezing draft blowing into her room. Her womanly body was reflected back at her in the mirror that sat near her bed, she quickly grabbed her smallclothes and concealed her blooming parts. A pinkish ray of light caught her eye and she made her way to the window, she was so high up in the castle she didn’t need to care about people spotting her from down below, and it was so early that septa's hadn’t even gathered their icy water from the well

The sunrise made her feel solemn, it was the first maiden’s day since she’d been nine years old that her most beloved friend, Everly, wouldn’t be there.

Plain and simple, to the eyes of the public, Everly was a bastard. To those who knew the truth, Yara Greyjoy had found a shivering, starving baby left on her Castle’s doorstep, and took the girl in as her own heir. Maiden’s day was a celebration of maidens, the young and innocent little girl’s untouched by the disgusting truth of the world. The blood of bastards was apparently tainted and born of sin, and they were shunned from even attending the celebration. Morganna almost laughed when she saw the Hellebores tied to the gates of the city.

She wasn’t married, nor taken by any man, but she hadn’t been innocent for a long time. At nine years old, thirty days after her favorite memory with Everly, where she sat above Winterfell and cuddled her friend in the window, she saw her own father kill a man.

He hadn’t intended on letting her see it, and he didn’t even know she did. The family of two parents, a daughter, and two sons, and a baby on the way, had to travel southward for something she can’t even seem to remember. No one in the south liked Sandor Clegane, hell, no one in the north did either, but at least Morganna never heard the things she heard in the south whilst in Winterfell.

“Dog!” “Murdering brute!” “Stupid Hound!” 

She’d heard it all before since she was old enough to know what it all meant. She hated hearing those awful men hurl insults at her father 

_ Her  _ father. The man that carried her around Winterfell on her shoulders, the man who taught her how to use a sword from the age of three the man that made her brothers laugh and behave in public when they were acting up, the man who made her mother feel safe and happy.

He wasn’t a dog, he wasn’t a brute, and he’d most certainly never kill anyone.

Morganna wished she could go back to being nine years old and thinking that just because someone is one way to you, doesn’t mean they’re the same way to everyone else.

After getting lost thanks to a dim-witted squire, at an inn near King’s landing, her mother and father spoke to an intoxicated room keep, trying to get directions south. Her younger brothers played calmly in the seat beside her, and she peered out the window to watch as her mother’s eyes grew wide as the moon, the man started yelling, and her father drew the sword.

Sansa clasped a hand over her mouth, keeping her gasp out of her children’s hearing, Sandor, in one swift motion impaled the greasy inn keep in one move. Morganna has never felt a fear of intimidation by her father, but the look in his eyes made her feel like he was a rabid dog attacking a squirrel. She remembers the way the man’s eyes bulged, his blood dropped down the sword, and how her mother looked away, clutching her protruding belly and giving her father a disappointed face. She saw him look back at Sansa, he rolled his eyes and she sunk back into the seat before she had to see him remove the blade.

She looked back over to see her brothers innocently playing, and she wanted nothing more than to go home. She never knew what the man said to anger her father in such a way, but she’ll never be able to travel south without seeing red droplets fly down the scrawny torso of the keeper. Her mother didn’t even look surprised.

She never told her parents what she saw, but she knew that her father knew she’d found out what he was.

For the rest of the trip she couldn’t look him in the eyes, she couldn't bear to give those who called him ‘murderer’ the evil eye for a month, and she had nightmares for a year. 

She’d seen more than just stabbing in the years that came after that, but something about the way that man looked at Sandor makes her sick to her stomach to this day.

_ The white dress hung freely at her ankles, her mother made sure her shoes were buckled tightly before she and Everly left the house. Her youthful, but sleep-deprived eyes shined a gorgeous sea blue in the dewy morning light. Her hair had been braided into two long pigtails, with velvet white ribbons accenting them and giving even more of a doll appearance. _

_ She watched as her friend shifted uncomfortably in her own dress. Smoothing her hair down uncharacteristically, and avoiding the eye contact of septa's as she and Morganna walked with fingers enclasped, holding unlit candles nonchalantly. _

_ The two made their way into the sept with what felt like hundreds of other girls in milky white gowns, simple braids, and chunky candles. Morganna plucked a maroon Hellebore from the bouquet at the door and stuck it into her friend’s hair. Her cheeks flushed pink at Morganna’s beautification, she wasn’t a girl’s girl in any sense. _

_ Septa lit the young girl’s candles one by one, the thick smell of beeswax hit the air like a brick. Everly watched a girl with deep green eyes and white-blonde hair set her candle in front of the statue of The Maiden God in the sept. Sad eyes, but a happy smile, she embraced a slightly younger-looking girl with ashy blonde hair and said it was her last maiden’s day, as she was promised to wed a man in the Riverlands that winter.  _

_ The heat of the candle made Morganna’s hand shake, but she’d been doing this since she was five, and walked pageant-like up to the altar. She left the candle front and center and winked at her friend as she awkwardly paced up to the statue and practically threw her candle down, looking at the floor the whole time. _

_ Everly grabbed Morganna’s hand the second she got back from the altar. They watched as pudgy toddlers were guided by septa’s to leave their candles by the statue, smiling endearingly at them as they sat down their candles with two hands grasping at the holder. Once every white candle was placed sacrificially around the Maiden, the girl’s young and pubescent joined bands in a prayer Everly pretended to know. _

_ Morganna winked at her knowingly as she began the chant of the prayer to the New Gods. Everly grew more and more alienated and hot cheeked when everyone around her smiled and said in almost perfect unison. _

_ “To our fair Maiden we pray, innocent and planted, wise and true, pious and loyal, all that is pure and untouched is offered to your spirit, honor us in our holy vows, and guide us through all that is sinful and tempting. Seven blessing upon thee.”  _

_ The faith of the seven, as rare as it is in the north, grew quite a following in Winterfell after the long winter, as many turned to faith for guidance in the long night. Morganna has grown up knowing the old gods and the new, making her own mother laugh when she purely stated she’d promise wed in front of a heart tree, but vow to all seven gods as well. Everly grew up with a sea god, one singular force in control of the sea, no harsh rules or expectations, the foreignness of it all was making her feel out of place. _

Morganna laced the high neck of her maiden’s day dress up tediously. She’d spent almost three weeks seeing it to perfection, detailing it with fine patterns of deer, birds, and a clan of wolves. The sleeves fit her arms like gloves, and the entire dress was a plushy velvet. She breathed in one deep breath, and silently begged, gods old and new, for a quick and uneventful trip outside her home. 

Standing at nearly 5’11 thanks to her heightly mother and humongous father, she towered over many of the girl’s in attendance of the sept. She was in a word, angelic. Her deep brown hair had curled almost magically, her eyes were so bright they’d been compared to the dornish sea by many lordship men after one too many sips of wine at a feast. She was stalky and graceful, many couldn’t believe she was at all like her father, she was seemingly all her mother with long limbs and a soft voice.

Her beige freckles popped sweetly from her cheeks in the muggy spring air. The morning sun was blazing and the cult of white clothed nymphs holding melting candles seemed more overwhelming than ever. She spotted a girl she’d seen at a party doing it with a soldier in a hallway when they were but only thirteen. She wanted to scoff, make a comment that came straight from the brain of the hound himself about the stupidity of this holiday she once loved so much.

Morganna looked at the girl as they set their candles down side by side. The septa smiled at both of them. She kissed her teeth, it didn’t really matter, whether she was pure and maidenly and the other girl wasn’t, they both had waxy, soft candles that hurt to hold onto for more than ten seconds.

Her childhood fears of being smited for lying at an altar were broken when the impure girl beside her didn’t immediately burst into flames.

She smiled at her warmly, and Morganna grabbed her soft hand. They were pushed closer together by the swarm of arrogant maiden’s wishing to pray in the most singsongy of voices.

Morganna cleared her throat, and they began their yearly chant.

  
  



End file.
